Reinvention
by muchtvs
Summary: This is a Ryan and Sophie one shot. Rated T for language.


**Disclaimer**: I do not own The OC. I wish very much that I did.

**Season:** Future Fic

**Author's note: **This is a teenage Sophie POV. She narrates from present to past. Hopefully it's clear.

**Thanks:** To Joey for betaing. All mistakes are mine. And thanks everyone for reading.

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Reinvention

by muchtvs

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_When I was a child, everybody smiled._

_Nobody knows me at all._

_ - The Weepies_

_xxxxxxxxxxxxxx _

Tamara is saying to me, "Sophie, I want to talk more with you about some of the possible root causes of your OCD."

I like what she's wearing today. It's like a burnt salmon color and it's the perfect time of the year for it. God, with her coloring, this shade is so perfect for her. And her bracelet and necklace both have some of the orange in them, which is like, amazingly well accessorized. Plus she's got to be, I'm thinking a size 6 at the most, and having your psychiatrist look so hot must totally not be conducive for helping girls who have self- image issues.

Not that I do.

Well, not anymore. Tamara is good at what she does.

Ok, so I might have a few self-image issues.

But nothing I can't control.

"Sophie?"

Oops. I forgot the question.

I smile at her innocently and ask, "I'm sorry. What was the question again?"

"I haven't actually asked a question yet," Tamara says. "But I'd like to. Can you tell me the first time you remember panicking about parking spaces?"

I know what you're thinking.

The hell?

Parking spaces????

But she's totally right.

I have this thing.

This thing about parking spaces.

When you pull into a parking lot, the first thing you have to do is look around because there has to be some acreage, know what I mean? You have to have, like, an outlier scatter pattern. There has to be a cluster, a herd of cars where most people park, and then there has to be some serious space in-between you and the rest of the flock.

That's the first rule of mine.

You have to park where no one else is parking.

That's the most crucial rule, so that rule is first.

That's a completely normal rule.

Asshole guys do it all the time. They don't want their cars dented so they take up two spaces and park sideways and park where no one else can hit their car with a car door so I don't think rule number one should count against me because really, it's a perfectly accepted rule amongst the general population of asshole, materialistic guys.

I tell Tamara parking lot rule number one.

I explain to her my default asshole guys justification, and how rule number one is a perfectly reasonable rule, but I know she's gonna' second guess me on that because she writes it down in her spiral.

"Do you have any other rules, Sophie?"

She's just being sarcastic now, because she knows of course…I have another rule.

I always have exactly three rules for everything.

She knows that.

"Rule number two for parking," I tell her, "is always count all your steps until you get to the entrance of wherever you're going. But you have to count in threes."

If you don't count all your steps, then something bad will happen to the car, and if something bad happens to your car, then…something bad will happen.

Tamara makes another note and then asks me, "Any other rules?"

She can be such a bitch. She _knows_ there's one more rule.

"Okay, rule number three is that you can't park during El Niño if winds exceed 80 miles per hour."

Now rule number three is becoming a serious hassle because all with global warming, the incidences of increased wind speed are happening with more frequency and this year's El Niño is suppose to be worse than a few years ago.

That totally sucks.

"Sophie, are you able to recognize that the majority of people do not have such rigid rules for simply parking?"

I nod and look at the carpet. "Yes. I know. Mom and Dad are always telling me that and I know they're right, I do, and I've tried to at least cut one rule out but that's too hard. There has to be…"

Tamara smiles, not to tease me I don't think, because it's more like a, _I understand_, kind of a smile. You know what I mean, right?

"Three rules," she says, finishing my sentence.

I nod.

Yep, I was right. She knew how many rules I always have.

"Sophie, we've made a lot of progress with your OCD rituals. I think it's time we tackled this one."

I don't think it's time, so I shake my head back and forth.

I don't want to talk about this.

"Do you know why I think it's time?" Tamara asks me.

I keep on shaking my head.

"Your mother called me yesterday and told me that in one month, you'll be getting your driver's permit. She also told me that she and your father have discussed with you that unless you can overcome your fear of parking, they are not going to allow you to get your driver's license. It's too scary for them, Sophie, thinking about you parking so far away from well lit areas or being isolated from people, in case something should happen to you on your way to or from the car. And your parents are right. Like it or not, you are a teenage girl and statistically, even if you park close to your destination, you are still at risk in a parking lot if you are alone. Parking far away from others is too dangerous."

I've been thinking about this whole not getting my license thing and I have a solution.

It's three pronged of course.

Rule One: Go to college in New York City.

Don't mean to brag, but I can slam dunk getting into Columbia.

And no one has a car in New York City. I will never have to drive.

Rule Two: Establish my career in New York City.

Rule Three: Never leave New York City.

I only tell Tamara about rule number one and two.

She says to me, "Sophie, now you are telling me that your parking ritual is going to determine where you go to school and your future as an adult? Do you see how much your fear is affecting your quality of life? What do we always say?"

I clear my throat and rote memory the pledge. "I control my OCD, my OCD doesn't control me."

Tamara smiles kindly at me and urges, "We need to talk about what happened to you and your brother when you were seven years old. We need to talk about what happened in that parking lot."

I don't want to talk about it.

"I want you to tell me what happened, Sophie. Your mother says that in her opinion, the event in the parking lot was the catalyst for your OCD."

I don't want to talk about this.

I learned a long time ago, that what people don't see…they can't stop.

So I've developed a coping strategy to count to three that people don't know I'm doing.

I tap my big toe against the bottom of my shoe. Even when I'm wearing flip flops or sandals, I can still do it without people noticing. And sometimes, and I swear this works, if I count to three, three times, then I won't have to do what someone is telling me I have to do.

"Sophie?'

Tap, tap, tap.

"Honey, I know this is hard."

Tap, tap, tap.

"You're a very intelligent young lady. I know you can recognize that we have to discuss what happened."

Tap, tap, tap.

"Do you think we should call Ryan? Have him sit in with us? Would that help you open up?"

Tap.

I stop my taping and look up at her.

She did _not_ just suggest we bring Ryan in on this disaster. She's being such a bitch.

"Your mother says he's never really talked about it either. Maybe it would be good for both of you. In a way, you'd be doing Ryan a favor."

Now I'm pissed.

"Don't patronize me!" I shout at her. "What am I, in freaking first grade? I know you're only mentioning bringing Ryan here to try and force me to talk about it now because you know damn well I don't ever, ever want him here."

My face is getting hot. I'm so pissed at her. I hate it when she's condescending to me.

I don't ever want Ryan to meet Tamara. I keep him and Seth far away from all of this, my seeing a psychiatrist, because I'm embarrassed and ashamed and no matter how many times I'm told not to be…I won't ever not be ashamed.

I fail at life.

I take a deep breath.

Tamara is looking at me like she might be slightly pissed herself and she says, "Since you have never raised your voice at me before in a session, or been so rude, I'm going to assume that your anger is a facade for your fear of talking about what happened with you and your bother."

I don't tap and I don't nod and I don't shake my head.

I don't want to talk about this.

"Sophie, you were only seven years old that day. You were still a very little girl. I can't imagine how frightened you were."

Now I nod, and I shake my head 'yes' and I look up at her and my head feels like it did that day, full and ready to burst, like it did when I started to cry once I realized what had happened.

"We need to talk about this, Sophie. You can do this. I know you can."

I sit in silence, my head down, thinking about tapping my big toe.

Tamara whispers my name, "Sophie?"

I glance up at her and tell her, "I remember how windy it was that day."

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Ryan picked me up from school. It was always awesome when he did that because that meant that Mom and Dad were going to most likely be busy that night and, _God_, did I love it when Ryan babysat me.

He was totally a guy, you know what I mean? He believed in the road of least resistance when it came to child care, which meant we were gonna' eat at McDonalds and good luck getting me to bed on time. Back then, I knew exactly how to manipulate Ryan, which also meant we were gonna' for sure stop at The Great Skate and go roller skating on the way home.

You should have seen Ryan whenever he took me roller skating back then. _That_…Seth would have paid to see.

I bounced into his jeep and the first thing out of my mouth was, "Ryan!" followed by, "Can you please take me roller skating? _Please_. I love you more than Seth."

He always laughed when I said that.

I knew I'd be roller skating in less than an hour.

He told me sure, we could go, but he had to stop at OfficeMax first to pick up something that he needed for some class he was taking.

I really didn't understand at that time that Ryan was getting his master's degree. I just thought that for some reason, he was in school longer than Seth had been and I was a little kid, right? So I thought it meant that Ryan was dumber than Seth. We had this girl in my first grade reading group, Lizzy, who was a really, really, bad reader and would read super slow and make mistakes and all I could imagine was Ryan sitting in front of his college class reading one word at a time and making all these mistakes and being all embarrassed and crying like Lizzy sometimes would.

So whenever Ryan mentioned that he needed to do something for school, I always was on my very best behavior, because I felt really, really bad for him, being the dumbest one in his college.

Anyway, so it was windy that day. I'll never forget it, because it was the windiest I ever remember it being.

The wind was so bad Ryan had to put the roof up on his jeep, even though it was hot out.

My Dad had tried to tell me that morning about El Niño and I basically understood why it was so windy, but I was seven and I honestly didn't care about the reasons behind the weird weather. I just hated the way the window in my bedroom rattled the night before.

I was so scared I had to go in my parent's bed.

Ryan and I stopped at OfficeMax and I started to open my car door but Ryan stopped me and told me, "Let me get your door today, Sophie. It's really windy out. I don't want the door getting away from you."

I remember at the time thinking, 'Doors aren't alive. How's it supposed to get away?'

But I do and always have trusted Ryan to pretty much know everything there is to know about this kind of thing, so I waited until he went around the car and opened my door for me before I got out.

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After we got done at OfficeMax, Ryan asked me if I was hungry yet and I was always hungry when I was seven, so we decided to go to McDonalds before roller skating.

See…this is when it gets hard for me to talk about what happened that day, because that day was going so well, you know what I mean?

That day was perfect.

That day probably would have been one of my best memories because when I was seven, I worshipped Ryan and my dad and Seth. I knew I was the sole center of attention when I was around them. I knew that all the other girls in my class were jealous, because I had the two biggest brothers of any of them and when my dad couldn't come to school for some reason on a day a dad needed to come, Ryan was always there and sometimes if a kid who didn't know me asked, "Is that your dad?" I would look over at Ryan and smile and say, "Yes."

Ryan has a daughter now, Hannah, and even though I wouldn't trade my dad for anything in the world, I find myself a little envious sometimes when I look over at Hannah holding Ryan's hand or on top of his shoulders because a long time ago, that little girl used to be me and sometimes, I really miss those days.

You know what I mean?

Okay, back to McDonalds. Sorry, I can be randomly off topic. It's a Cohen thing.

Anyway, so it was windy. I told you that. We pulled into McDonalds and I was excited beyond explanation. It's not like I couldn't go to McDonalds pretty much whenever I wanted. But for some reason, I always got positively ridiculous as soon as we pulled into a fast food restaurant.

Seth has this theory that McDonalds controls the youth of America through the use of Happy Meals toys. He's probably right. Any rate, I was hugely excited about being there.

Too excited to remember what Ryan had told me about my car door.

I know it seems so stupid now. I know that. God, such a stupid thing.

I opened the door without waiting for Ryan and the wind took off with it and I heard this 'thud' and I looked up and my door was wedged solid against the car next to us.

Absolutely, totally, wedged.

Ryan said, "Oh man, Sophie," and I just kinda' sat there.

He came around to my side and gently eased my door off the other car's frame, but it didn't matter how careful he was, because the damage had already been done. I saw him examining the other car and running his finger over the dent I had caused. It didn't help that the paint had been scratched.

He went around to his driver's side and opened his door and got in the jeep, telling me, "That's like a vintage Jaguar, Soph. This is gonna' be a problem."

I wasn't sure what he meant by that, but Ryan usually never talked that serious to me, so I knew it must be bad and I slouched over into myself, trying to disappear.

I remember being selfish, thinking, 'I hope Ryan still gets me McDonalds for dinner.'

I didn't know then.

I didn't know how serious some people are about their cars.

I wasn't worried about that.

I was worried about getting a Happy Meal.

Ryan got out as sheet of paper and started writing down something on it. I asked him what it was and he told me he was going to leave his name and phone number because he couldn't just drive off.

He tried to sound nice to me, I know that, but Ryan has always been one to have trouble masking completely how he feels at a tense moment and I could see by how his jaw was all tight and how he wasn't looking directly at me that he was mad.

"Why can't we just go away?" I asked him. "Then they won't know who did it."

Ryan told me, "Because Mom and Dad wouldn't want us to."

I remember those were the exact words he used.

The exact words.

He made an effort to smile at me, cause that's the kind of guy Ryan is, and then he got out of the car and I watched him through my plastic window, walk over to the windshield of the other car and lift up a wiper and put the note under it.

I have in my memory, the image of that little piece of paper flapping in the wind at a frenzied pace, up and down and up and down, like a bird with it's wing trapped.

Ryan was circling back around to get into his driver's seat…when the man came.

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Mom used to like to pretend that I didn't know cuss words when I was seven, but please, she was delusional.

Between Ryan and Seth and Dad, I could basically spell all of them. All but one, which was the one I only heard once in a while if I was watching a movie I wasn't suppose to watch.

When the man came out of McDonalds and walked to his car and saw what I had done to his door, he looked over at Ryan and said really, really loud, "What the fuck!"

As soon as I heard that 'fuck,' I didn't want only myself to disappear.

I wanted to take Ryan with me.

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Once, when I was a freshman and doing a social studies report on modern American culture and how the rise in domestic abuse among the middle class was a direct result of increased violence in video games and in the media, Ryan told me something about when he was a kid.

That's rare, Ryan ever saying anything about before he came to live with Mom and Dad.

We were sitting at the dinner table and Ryan had come over that night just to see us and I said something like, "God, what kind of person hits their own kid? How scummy do you have to be to do that?"

I forgot, that even though no one admits to buying a carton of them, there are still plenty of eggshells in our house you need to be careful not to walk on.

Dead silence came over the room.

My mom snuck a glance at my dad and my dad looked over at Ryan and Ryan looked at his salad.

Then he sat up and he looked at me.

"I think people just get overwhelmed with work and life and money," he said. "I don't think they want to hit their kids. It's just sometimes…the kids get in the way of everything."

I nodded because I wanted him to understand…that I understood. And I thought about what to say for a second, because Ryan never talked about what he just talked about, especially if I was around, and I know it would have made Seth uncomfortable if he had been here, but it didn't make me uncomfortable, not in the same way it would have made Seth feel.

It made me feel special, important that Ryan was telling me this.

I nodded and then I said, "I think you're right. I think that they must still love their children. Maybe they forgot how to tell them that."

Ryan and my dad have always had the inside advantage as to why people get so mad and act so violent. Ryan survived it and my dad, when he used to have his other job, tried to protect others from it.

But I didn't understand any of that back then.

I was only seven that day in the parking lot.

All I saw was an angry man coming towards Ryan.

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"Did you do this?" the man yelled at Ryan.

Ryan ran his fingers through his hair and glanced through his window at me.

The windows of Ryan's jeep were plastic, not soundproof, and if he was checking to see if I was listening…I was.

"Sorry, man," Ryan said. "The wind got my sister's door. I left you all my information. That's a great car you have. I'm really sorry."

The man didn't stop coming.

I don't know what Seth or my dad would have done.

But Ryan just stood there.

And he watched the man come closer and then a second later, Ryan opened his door quickly and told me, "Lock your door, Sophie," before locking his own door and slamming it shut.

I heard through the plastic Ryan say, "Look, I'm very sorry this happened. If you want me to meet with you later and talk about this, I can. But I have a seven year old in the car and she's already scared. I left you all my information. I have insurance. I'm going to leave now."

The man stopped walking and Ryan gave him one more look and unlocked his door and started to get into the jeep.

I was the first one who noticed the man running at Ryan and I let my brother know the guy was trying to tackle him by letting out the biggest scream I had ever screamed.

But I was too late and the man was too angry.

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"I know I can't stop here," I tell Tamara. "But can I get a drink of water?"

My hands are shaking.

I don't want to talk about this.

"Of course," she says and stands up when I stand up.

Tamara keeps a small fridge full of water in her office and as I lean into it to grab a bottle, I stand with the door open a second and let the cool air hit me.

"Sophie?" Tamara asks. "Are you alright?"

"I'm thirsty," I tell her.

I don't want to talk about this.

Tap, tap, tap.

When I blink, I see Ryan and the man fighting.

Tap, tap, tap.

When I was little, Seth used to joke about Ryan and his throw downs against some guy named Luke, but it always sounded funny when Seth told the story.

Tap, tap, tap.

I had never seen Ryan fight before. Not until that day with that man. I didn't even have a clue that Ryan could fight, other than being able to pin Seth against the carpet occasionally until Seth would yell, "Release me. I'm a pacifist."

Tap, tap, tap.

I sit back down, clutching my bottle of water.

"Sophie?" Tamara asks me.

"I didn't know Ryan could fight," I tell her. "I didn't know until that day."

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The plastic windows made things blurry, like if you looked through Saran Wrap, and the wind was causing them to flap back and forth, like that trapped bird and all I could think about was my bedroom window and the howling outside of it.

The man had grabbed Ryan from behind as he was getting into the jeep, causing Ryan to spin around. But Ryan recovered quickly and I saw him hit the man, Ryan's shoulder whipping around like a windmill and the man went down fast, out of my sight of vision.

"Stay down!" Ryan yelled at the man. "What the hell are you doing? It's only a fucking dent!"

And even though I was crying now and scared, I thought it was over, because Ryan was right and I thought the man would realize it.

It was such a stupid thing. It was only a dent.

I bet if I asked Ryan now, today, why he didn't continue to beat the guy up, he'd tell me because he didn't think it would go any further. He thought the guy would calm down after the first punch. My dad told me once, when I was older, that Ryan learned a lot when he was young, about getting into fights and how much more trouble that could cause.

Maybe that's what Ryan was thinking when instead of kicking the guy to keep him down, he let the man get up. But I think Ryan stopped fighting because he remembered I was in the car, and Ryan didn't want me seeing him like that. He didn't want me seeing what he was capable of.

The man didn't calm down.

He rushed at Ryan again and they kept fighting and there are few details I can never remember exactly.

Like how Ryan slipped and smashed his head against the concrete.

I think when I was seven, I figured it was the wind that had knocked him over, because it had never been as windy as it was that day.

I was crying, but it was the soft kind, and I heard the man say, "Get up." But Ryan didn't.

The man repeated, "Get up."

I didn't know where Ryan went.

I couldn't see him and that scared me more than the fighting.

When the man said, "Oh God," instead of, "Get up," I knew Ryan had lost the fight.

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Tamara and my mom and my dad want to know when I started counting.

Mom knows it was that day in the parking lot and now she's told Tamara and now…Tamara wants me to tell her the why and the how of that day.

I remember I started screaming in earnest, over and over again, because I didn't know where Ryan had gone.

The man disappeared too, leaning far over for a second, before returning to where I could see him. He looked both ways, all around, and I thought maybe he would leave a note for whoever found Ryan, with his cell phone number on it and his information on it, the same as Ryan had done when I had let the wind have my door and dent the man's car.

"We need some help over here!" The man yelled.

Then he looked at me through the window.

And I shut my eyes and I counted to three.

When I opened them, he was gone, away from the window, with his cell phone open. I couldn't hear what he was saying.

I know now that he was calling an ambulance and already confessing his sins.

I heard someone yell, "Dad?" and suddenly a teenager was there.

I don't now for sure where he came from but there he was, like a magic trick, like out of thin air.

"Dad, what happened?" he asked frantically.

He kinda' looked like Seth, with dark, curly hair that was longer than I bet his dad wanted it to be.

I saw the man talking to his son and then he disappeared again below the view of the window.

The boy ran around to the black car I had hit and opened one of its doors and grabbed what I think was paper towels and as he was running back to the side of the jeep, he saw me, and he stopped and stared at me, as if I frightened him much more than he could have frightened me.

I remember my throat and my head hurt, so I stopped crying as hard as I had been.

You know when you're a kid…how you don't have a real grasp of time?

It seemed like forever but in reality it must have been only a few minutes before the police and then the ambulance arrived. A policeman tried to get me to open my door, but I wouldn't have any part of that. So he resorted to a knife and slicing the plastic open and I tried to bite him as he pulled me from the jeep.

Policemen must be very patient.

Because I think I must have asked at least a million times, "Where's Ryan?"

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These are the things that were in threes the day that Ryan hit his head in the parking lot.

Three seconds in-between the police car's sirens.

Three nurses that talked to me while I waited for my parents.

Three pats on the head I got from the policemen as they sat with me.

Three little lights along the hospital walls.

One. Two. Three.

In the jeep, when I closed my eyes and counted to three, the man disappeared from my window.

One. Two. Three.

I counted the tiles on the hospital floor.

One, two, three at a time.

I closed my eyes.

First the policeman came.

Second, the nurses.

Third, my parents.

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Seth was in Rhode Island living with Summer and Aunt Julie was hours away.

So I stayed in the hospital with my parents and waited for someone to tell us about Ryan.

I fell asleep on my dad's lap and woke up on my mom's.

I was learning how to tell time in the first grade.

Ryan had picked me up from school at two-thirty.

When I looked up at the clock on the wall, it said eight.

I should be at home, getting ready for bed. Mom and Dad should have been at the party they were dressed to go to.

My mom is still beautiful, but when I was little, I didn't realize that anyone could be as pretty as she was. She had a long black dress on in the hospital and her hair up, arranged in a complicated mass and I remember playing with the curls that hung down the back of her neck.

Twirling them, one, two, three, as my dad walked around the room, stopping once in a while to kiss us.

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"I want to stop talking now," I tell Tamara. "Nothing else happened that night."

"Do you remember anything more?" she asks me.

I nod and I tell her, "But it isn't important. So I'm stopping now."

I. Do. Not. Want. To. Talk. About. This.

"It must have been a terrifying experience," she says.

God, she's so textbook. Please. Yes, Tamara, it was not exactly the most comforting moment of my childhood.

"When did you find out what happened to Ryan?" she asks me.

I hate her so much right now. I should be done. I've given her enough.

The rest of what happened belongs to me.

I fail at life.

"Sophie, we need to talk more about Ryan."

"I don't want to," I whisper before closing my eyes.

There are three rules when you are trying to forget that you can remember something.

"Sophie, you need to talk about what happened to your brother."

Rule One: Never talk about it.

"Sophie."

Rule Two: Pretend it didn't happen.

"I want you to tell me when you found out about Ryan, Sophie."

Rule Three: Never, ever talk about it.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

I had never seen my dad cry before, not until after what happened in the parking lot.

He cried in our kitchen.

Seth and Summer had flown in the day after Ryan's 'accident'.

Everyone always called it an accident, as if what happened to Ryan didn't have its own name.

Mom was with Ryan in the hospital that morning.

Seth and Dad thought I was asleep.

It's Seth's fault I snuck in the room.

He's the one who taught me how to stealth.

Dad had his head resting on his palm and his elbow on the counter and his head was bobbing up and down and even though he was quiet, I knew he was crying.

I knew something was very, very wrong with Ryan.

I was just waiting for someone to tell me what it was.

"Maybe the damage won't be permanent," Seth told Dad.

I was in the first grade. Permanent meant something that wouldn't come out. We had to use washable markers in school so nothing would stain our clothes.

"What exactly have his doctors told you and Mom?" Seth asked.

Dad lifted his head and used the sleeve of his shirt to wipe his eyes and Seth handed him a napkin. My dad stared into space and it took a while before he said anything.

I counted the time as it passed in ones and twos and threes.

"I don't know," he finally said. "None of them say the same thing. Not a single doctor can even tell us how long they think the coma will last."

I coughed on accident. My throat had a tickle and I forgot I was in stealth mode.

"Hey, Soph," Seth said softly, coming over to me and lifting me into his arms. "You're getting so big."

I laid my head on his shoulders and all I could think about was how good it was, to still be small enough for him to hold me.

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When I was a kid, I absolutely loved Summer. She was the one adult who always made sense to me. Now that I'm older, I still love her with all my heart. I just can't always understand her.

"Do you remember Snow White?" Summer asked me back then. "That's kinda' what a coma is."

_Finally_, someone was telling me something I could work with.

Three things.

First, the man in the car was the same as the old witch with the apple.

Second, Ryan was asleep, just like Snow White.

Third, now all we needed was Taylor.

"Can Taylor come to the hospital and kiss Ryan?" I asked.

Summer looked at me perplexed a second and then smiled and held up her finger and said to Seth, "See? That's what I'm talking about Cohen. That's the kind of attitude we need around here. Who needs to wait for Chrismukkah? Miracles are always in season."

"I'm confused," Seth said.

"Yeah, about that," Summer told him. "We don't care."

She grabbed me by the hand and we called Taylor that day and we told her to come to the hospital in San Francisco, because seven days ago, a man made Ryan hit his head and now Ryan wasn't waking up and we needed a Prince Charming or as Summer put it, "Or Ms. Charming, Or whatever. Just get your pseudo-French ass back to the states. Now, Townsend."

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I smile a little as I tell Tamara this part.

The part when Summer made me feel visible again because until her, nobody wanted me to be living in the same world as them. Nobody wanted me to not be sleeping like the rest of them weren't and hiding in a room to cry and spending more time at the hospital then at home.

I wasn't sure if anybody wanted me at all when Ryan was still asleep.

I didn't know where I fit.

"Summer has always been an important part of your life. Like a sister right?" Tamara asks me. "It sounds like she really took you under her wing."

I nod and tell Tamara, "The same day we called Taylor, Summer talked Mom and Dad into letting me see Ryan. Nobody wanted me to see him except for her. Summer somehow knew that I wanted to understand what was happening, but I couldn't unless I saw him for myself."

I think sometimes Summer knew me so well when I was a child because she spent half her life without a mother being home. I think maybe that why sometimes still to this day, when she talks and thinks out loud and comes to conclusions, she still sounds like a little girl.

"What was it like when you saw him?" Tamara asks me.

I want to leave her office.

But I can't.

This isn't even the hardest part yet.

"Well," I say, "Mom and Dad and Seth, everyone had told me what to expect. But I was only seven and to me, it only looked like Ryan was sleeping."

There were crazy things, scary machines all around him, but I used to crawl into bed with Ryan when he slept at home on the weekends and I was used to hearing him breathe whenever I laid my head on his chest.

So that's what I did, I closed my eyes and laid my head on his chest and I counted.

One, two, three.

When I opened my eyes, he was still asleep.

"Should I kiss him?" I asked Summer.

When she told me yes, I leaned over and pretended it was his birthday or something like that and I kissed him on his cheek and I counted to three, but it didn't work.

He didn't wake up.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

There was one night, during all the nights that Ryan was in his coma, when all of us, everyone last one of us, sat at the same table and we ate dinner together.

Dawn and Frank were with Ryan that night. Seth taught me to call them, "Mr. Frank and Mrs. Stein," up until I was five and Mom caught him coaching me and that stopped that.

By the time I was seven, I just called them Frank and Dawn. It was easier on everyone.

We ordered huge amounts of take out from wherever anyone wanted and it's the only memory of this time I have that isn't interrupted by fragments.

Taylor said to everyone, "You know Ryan, he's just being stubborn. Please pass the Samgyeopsal, Kirsten."

Taylor was always using words that make no sense. She still does.

"Taylor," my mom said, "Honey, I don't what that is."

Taylor pointed to this weird looking dish of stuff with her chop stick and told Mom with a huge nod, "You should try some, it's really good."

Seth and I were eating Pizza.

Mom was eating Mexican.

Taylor, Korean and Summer, vegetarian.

I remember looking at Dad and realizing he wasn't eating anything at all.

It was a nice night.

The only one missing was Ryan.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Tamara wants to know more.

And I know I should tell her.

So I close my eyes.

Because the next part, this next part, is the worst part of all.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Ryan had been asleep too long. Even I was able to comprehend that. I marked off the days in bright red marker on the Superman calendar Seth had given me that last Christmas.

On the fourteenth day, Ryan woke up.

Taylor was the one with him when it happened.

I was right.

She was his Ms. Charming.

Taylor was, and still is, the most unrealistic, most amazingly, irrationally, upbeat person I have ever met.

If there's a blizzard, then in Taylor's world, she simply has more ice shavings for a gigantic snow cone.

Nothing brings Taylor Townsend down.

So when Taylor ,of all people , was crying inconsolably in the hallway after Ryan woke up, I knew that what we had all been waiting for to happen…hadn't happened.

I remember tugging on Seth's sleeve.

"What's wrong?" I asked him. "I thought we were supposed to be happy."

"It's complicated, Soph," he told me.

But that wasn't good enough for me. I had waited all this time, all those check marks on my calendar. Everyone kept saying, "All we have to do is wait for Ryan to wake up." And Ryan had done that, he had woken up.

"But why aren't we happy? I thought when Ryan woke up it would be okay."

"He hit his head too hard," Seth told me. "It's like when you bump your arm. There's a bruise."

I said to Seth, "His head looks okay. There's no bruise on it."

Seth bent down on one knee and took both of my arms and forced me to focus in on him.

"This is different, Soph. You can't see Ryan's bruise. It's on the inside of his head, on his brain."

I didn't understand that.

I closed my eyes.

One, two, three. One, two, three.

One, two, three.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"Did anyone ever explain to you, at that time, what brain damage was?"

I know Tamara means well, that she's trying to make me feel comfortable talking about it.

But I didn't want to be interrupted at this part.

I want to get this part over with as fast as I can.

"I'm sure they tried," I tell her. "But it was hard for me. I was so young. I didn't understand what was wrong. He looked the same. He still looked exactly like Ryan."

I think maybe I have temporarily stumped Tamara.

She seems at a loss of words as to what to say.

"He was, uh…he was in the rehab hospital for a few months. I remember visiting him with Mom and Dad. Mostly I played on the equipment. I know now, that they probably didn't want me seeing Ryan in therapy. I was already freaked out enough by the 'accident'. And I don't think either one of them wanted Ryan to see me."

"Why not?" Tamara asks.

And now comes the hardest part…of the hardest part.

Now's the reason that parking lots need rules and now is the reason that everything can be controlled by counting to three.

"Why didn't they want Ryan seeing you, Sophie?"

I lower my head.

Tap, tap, tap.

I don't want to talk about this.

"Sophie?"

Tamara should wear burnt salmon more often.

She looks good in it.

I clear my throat, take a sip of water and tell her, "They uh, they didn't want Ryan to see me because even at this point in his recovery, when they showed him pictures of me, he still didn't remember who I was."

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Before that day in the parking lot, when I was seven, I loved all my family, but deep down, whenever Ryan would come home, that was what I lived for.

He was so much younger than Mom and Dad and he was able to play with me longer than they could. And Ryan was so different than the rest of them, quieter but willing to spend more time with me than even Mom was, even if the time was just sitting in the same room together watching television.

Ryan was at Berkeley to be an architect from the time of my first memory of him. From when I could remember, Ryan had always been in school

We used to build his models together, starting from when I was very, very young.

My job was to pass him the glue and he would act like my job was, literally, the most crucial step in the whole process.

Ryan taught me how to categorize by separating model pieces. He taught me about how things are balanced and why buildings can, and need to sway, and how it all depends on what kind of ground they are built on.

He taught me gravity and inertia and probably a dozen other principles I was too young to realize I was learning.

And after he had put the glue on a piece of whatever model he was building, he would look at me with anticipation, waiting for me to count with him.

Ryan was the one who taught me how to count to three.

It took three long seconds for a model piece to be permanently glued.

"Okay, Sophie, you ready?" he would ask. "Count with me. Onnneeee, Twoooooo, Threeeee."

Ryan is the one who taught me that, "One, two, three," is what makes things stick together and never fall apart.

xxxxxxxxxxx

I promised myself that I wouldn't cry when I told Tamara this part.

That Tamara wouldn't do that to me.

She wouldn't make me break the rules of how not to remember.

But I'm admitting to her that I remember.

I'm crying.

I fail at life.

"Sophie, do you need a break?" she asks me.

"Yes," I answer with an awkward, sob-chocked laugh, "About nine years ago."

None of this is funny. But I'm a Cohen. It's what we do.

"Sophie, honey. Why don't we take a few minutes off. I'll call your mother, tell her we're running behind schedule."

Tamara leaves the office.

I've never cried in front of anyone before, not about Ryan.

I don't want to think about this.

Tap, tap, tap.

When Ryan came home from physical and occupational and speech and language rehab, he had gotten his money's worth from the therapy. He was walking and talking. He would forget things, simple things, like where his bedroom was and my dad would say, "Same thing happens to me all the time, kid."

He didn't remember the last two years of college.

It was as if he had never started his master's.

Living with Ryan was like living with one of those weird machines that spits out lottery ping-pong balls through a vacuumed powered tube. You never knew what information would come out.

Ryan knew stuff that would have made sense if he had forgotten it, like that he had to pay his car insurance on the nineteenth of each month, or his high school locker combination, but he forgot things he should have been able to remember.

Important things.

Important things…like me.

Tap, tap, tap.

After he came home, he would still talk to me, still say my name. "Good morning, Sophie." But it sounded different, different than how Ryan used to say it.

My Dad and Mom told me that Ryan would need time. That the doctors openly admitted that brain injuries were somewhat predictable in patterns, but never with each individual.

I didn't understand any of it, most especially the part concerning why my brother forgot who I was.

Tap, tap, tap.

I was only seven. I just wanted him back.

It was like I was still sitting in the jeep that day, asking the policeman, "Where's Ryan?"

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"Ryan can't drive anymore. Did my mom tell you that?" I ask Tamara.

She shakes her head, 'no'.

"Your mother doesn't discuss the rest of your family with me, not in detail."

"He can't," I say. "Something about balance or equilibrium. He hasn't blacked out in five years, but I know Mom's scared to death at the thought of him even trying, so he doesn't. I don't think he can ever get a license again. But I'm not sure."

Tamara nods and makes a scribble in her spiral. I can't imagine what she could possibly write down about me from that statement, so maybe the reason she can afford her amazing clothes is because she works part-time for the DMV and she's making a note for her co-workers to keep an eye out for one Ryan Atwood trying to pass himself off as a competent California driver.

"But Ryan got his master's degree," I tell her. "He's a kick ass architect. Granted, they don't let him walk on the high-beams without a million safety harnesses…but yeah….he's like amazing. You should see what he designed in my bedroom. Actually, all of the rooms of the house. Between Ryan and Mom, it's like we never have the same house for a year in a row."

I blame my current situation, my inability to stop talking to Tamara, on my brother Seth. We blame almost everything on him already, but at least I know…the talking?

Totally Seth's fault.

"Oh, and I don't think I told you that Ryan and Taylor got married. I'll bring in a picture of Hannah next time I come. God, she's gorgeous."

I'm thinking about Hannah as I say her name. Technically, we aren't related by blood. But she looks like me, when I was two. Fine, blond hair and deep blue eyes.

I don't want to admit to Tamara how sad it makes me feel sometimes, once in a while, when I see Ryan with Hannah, when I see the two of them together.

"It sounds like despite everything that has happened to him, Ryan is a survivor," Tamara says, and God, like she has _any_ idea of the truthfulness behind that statement. "It seems like he's moved on, as best he can."

I was waiting for something like that.

I was waiting for Tamara to earn her money and sneak something psychologically inclined at me.

"Do you think it's time for you to do the same, Sophie? Move on from what happened?"

Tap, tap, tap.

There are three rules about that day in the parking lot that I keep to myself.

Rule One: Don't ever expect Ryan to ever be the same when he's with me as he was before the 'accident', because he can't be.

Rule Two: Don't let anyone know that even though they _say_ it's not my fault about what happened in the parking lot, I know deep down, they all think it is.

Rule Three: Don't hate Ryan because it's not his fault that I have to remember what happened, while he's lucky enough to be the one who gets to forget.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

I'm hungry.

Clearly what Tamara and I are talking about should take precedence…but I really want a churro.

I know that's random, but I like how they crunch.

Tamara is telling me it's time to move on.

"We're going to take things one small step at a time," she says to me. "When I phoned your mother just now, I told her I was very proud of you, Sophie. Today was a very difficult day. You have exceeded my expectations."

She makes me sound like a prized investment.

Actually, it kind of feels nice. I smile a little bit.

Steps should come in three. I hope she remembers that when Tamara makes suggestions to me about changing my parking lot rules.

"This is what I want you to do, Sophie," she says, speaking softly so I have to lean in towards her and give her all my attention.

"Your parents are going to take you to the mall tomorrow. And you are going to allow them to park in the middle of all the other shoppers' cars. You're not going to yell at them until they park somewhere else and you are not going to start hyperventilating or shut down and refuse to get out of the car. I know this sounds very hard, because you have been conditioning yourself for years to resort to your 'parking rules' to help you cope with what happened when you were a child. But look how far we got today, how much you told me. I think you're ready for this, don't you Sophie?"

Tap, tap, tap.

I nod.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Mom and Dad can be irritatingly optimistic. They drive to Sun Valley like we are getting ready to attack the mall and reclaim the land in the name of Cohen. I hate when they band together in the name of the same cause.

Especially if the cause in question is me.

"Okay, Sophie, here we go!" My dad says, with a smile so wide it's hitting his eyebrows. "You can do it, honey!"

"What does Tamara always have you say?" My mom asks me, even though she knows damn well the answer.

I mumble at her, "I control my OCD, my OCD doesn't control me."

"Just do the best you can," my dad says. "You know we're rooting for you, honey. Go team Cohen."

This is humiliating.

And a little bit ridiculously funny.

And scary.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Dad finds a place in the middle of the car herd, but he takes pity on me and pulls into a spot that has an open space next to it.

I honestly do not think I have ever been this close to one of Sun Valley's entrances.

I can feel myself tensing up and I silently begin repeating, three times of course, Tamara's ridiculous victory march.

Dad parks.

Turns off the car.

My parents sit like statues in the front seat.

"Are you okay?" my mom asks.

"I think so," I tell her.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Tamara never asked me yesterday, during our session, about where Ryan and I are now.

How we see each other from our own point of views.

What we've become to each other.

When I was seven, I sat screaming in a jeep while I witnessed Ryan's wax wings melting.

When he came home, I had to reinvent him.

I had to build him a new pedestal.

I had to teach him how to never, ever, forget me again.

There were three rules I made up eight years ago for Ryan.

Rule One: Have Seth buy Ryan and me a model kit.

Tell Ryan what my job is. Show him how good I can hold a piece, even the smallest one, when we glue the model together. I had to put the glue on myself. Ryan's hands were always too shaky.

Rule Two: Get used to it.

No more Ryan picking me up at school. No more roller skating. No more McDonalds. No more arguing if Ryan told me to go to bed, because after Ryan's 'accident,' Mom and Dad were always home with us. It was never just Ryan and me anymore.

Rule Three: Don't ever, ever park too close to anyone.

Don't ever, ever let anyone you love park and open their car door when El Niño is visiting. Don't ever, ever forget to count by threes when you walk from your car to where you are going and back.

One, two, three.

Count by threes or something bad will happen to someone.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"Are you okay?" mom asks me.

"I think so," I tell her.

We all walk up to the mall together, all three of us, and they talk to me, I'm sure, because Tamara told them to try and not let me count.

Dad suggests where to eat lunch and I say, "That sounds perfect."

Mom wants to stop by GapKids for something for Hannah and I tell her, "Good idea."

I talk to them the whole way up to the entrance.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

I learned a long time ago, that what people don't see…they can't stop

Tap, tap, tap, my big toe taps the bottom of my shoe all the way from the car to the mall and back to the car again.

Sophie Cohen's most important rule of all: Always tap by threes.

It'll keep something bad from happening to Ryan.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The End!

Thanks for reading folks.


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